ELEPHANT TO JONATHAN, HORSE, PETER, ROG, AND OTHER REINDEER, WITH A SPECIAL
WITTGENSTEINIAN CHRISTMAS INVITATION TO STRUAN:
JONATHAN WROTE:
I think that pachyderm has hit the nail on the head with this one, and
rightly asks for us to define metaphysics. IMO, everyone operates under a
set of assumptions or guideline that constitute a worldview (philosophy).
Some people, like Struan, Einstein, Iris Murdoch and thousands of other
philosophers realise the fact. The man in the street does not - thus he
frequently fails to question his assumptions and recognise their
limitations. Unfortunately, our collective approach is the latter, and this
(IMO) is what Pirsig says very forcefully.
ELEPHANT:
Indeed. In that, atleast, Prisig is doing the work of Socrates himself.
And Socrates, I'd venture, wouldn't be put off from continuing to question
assumptions merely by a dose of verbal abuse. He'd probably give as good as
he got (why does everyone always go to Shakespeare in search of literary
insults? - Plato's are usually more keenly aimed at the dogs of wisdom, who
love only what they know. - parenthetically, the point of that comment in
the Republic, it has always seemed to me, was that a good philosopher should
love precisely what he does *not* know, and remain for ever fascinated in
and questioning about that mystery, not clinging dog-like to the ideas which
feed him regularly at six).
I agree with Jonathan that the man in the street has no special
philosophical authority, and this is a point that was made more breifly by
Peter earlier on. However Struan, I think, is commited to the idea that the
man in the street does have some special philosophical authority (unless he
has been reading Prisig, that is), and I think this connects well with my
suspicions about Struan being a Wittgensteinian (of the Philosophical
Investigations ilk) - a suggestion I have made several times and which
Struan has yet to reject.
And something else which fits my hunch here is that a Wittgensteinian thinks
of himself, most ardently indeed, as a Monist, not a Dualist: a monism of
public criteria. So a Wittgensteinian Struan will have several kinds of
reasons for rejecting the SOM concept: (1) he thinks of his philosophy as
proceeding from commonsense, and therefore retrofits his own philosophy onto
commonsense (the famed 'man in the street'), (2) he thinks of his philosophy
as doing away with all metaphysics (and thus as doing away with the
attribution of metaphysical views to the 'man on the street'), (3) he thinks
of his philosophy as doing away with 'substance' and replacing it with
'grammar' (so he and the Man On The Street can't be a dualist about
substance, subject or object, because he thinks he has done away with
substance), (4) he thinks of himself as laying open every investigatable
topic in the one arena of study, ie the study of language games and grammar
(hence the thought that he and the Man On The Street are (kind of) monists,
not dualists), (5) he thinks of himself as a kind of sceintist of natural
language (hence the self-description 'empiricist'), (6) he regards truth as
wholly relative to language games rather than the good (hence Struan's talk
of different kinds of truth: scientific truth, religious truth,
philosophical truth etc, which, for Pragamatist ears, he translates as a
concern with different kinds of 'purposes').
The wittgensteinian cap fits rather well, doesn't it Struan, and I know how
much you enjoy curtailing a long bit of "fatuous" comment with a single
pithy word, so here's your chance. Am I right in my conjecture about your
Philosophical Sympathies? Yes or no.
Now, onto 'that's what I call dialogue!' No.152:
> From: "Struan Hellier" <struan@clara.co.uk>
> Reply-To: moq_discuss@moq.org
> Date: Mon, 25 Dec 2000 02:33:45 -0000
> To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
> Subject: RE: MD Strawman and Harmony
>
> Greetings,
>
> ELEPHANT:
> "Er, OK. But I'm still puzzling about how Prisig can be wrong (talking
> "rubbish") about SOM, if SOM is just his invention."
>
> Precisely the sort of fatuous comment which makes rational dialogue with you
> tedious. My argument is evidently not, "that Pirsig ascribes X to THOSE
> PEOPLE, while THOSE PEOPLE often maintain NOT X," as you claim. It is that
> Pirsig ascribes X to those people, while those people do not actually hold
> that position. Once that is grasped the rest of your posting falls away.
ELEPHANT:
You still don't get it, do you? I have explained that holding "that
position" is not simply a matter of what position someone *says* they hold.
You cannot deny this obvious truism, and you have not taken the trouble to
deal with my exegetical arguments showing how SOM is, indeed, just the
position which they do hold (despite protestations to the contrary). Nor
have you, as yet, explained what 'metaphysics' means in your language, such
that SOM isn't really a metaphysics. If you are a wittgensteinian, under
all that bluster, then your denial that SOM is a metaphysics all falls into
place (everything becomes clear) and we can have a serious argument about it
(I do keep repeating the invitation!).
STRAUN THOUGHT EVERYTHING I SAID WAS "FATUOUS":
> Apart from:
>
> ELEPHANT:
> "Please explain, because I'm rather puzzled. How can Prisig be
> talking 'rubbish' about what SOM involves if nobody beleives SOM? Because
> if Prisig has invented SOM, it can legitimately be said to comprise just
> exactly what Prisig says it comprises."
>
> [STRUAN:] Because no argument can be modally stronger than its modally weakest
point.
ELEPHANT:
HUH? What modally weakest point might that be? Please Explain.
STRUAN WROTE:
> If I invent a grolbeech (an animal with the head of a penguin and the body
> of a goat) it doesn't mean that one is running around somewhere, and if I
> said it was, you would be quite right to give the retort, 'rubbish'.
> (actually that was cleared up in my previous paragraph, but I felt like
> inventing a grolbeech).
PUZZLED ELEPHANT:
Invent away! But your point is what exactly? As far as I recall, Prisig
didn't talk about Grobeeches, he talked about a Subject-Object metaphysics.
You seem to think that Prisig's argument is just the old ontological proof,
where the place of ens realismum is taken by SOM, so that Prisig thinks of
it, and thinking of it, reasons that it must actually exist. Well excuse
me, but I assume you have read Zen and the Art... & Lila? Because if you
have, you might recall some time taken to show how the SOM fits the actual
(as opposed to announced) patterns of thought in Antropology, English
Literature (rhetoric), Science, Philosophy, et cetera et cetera... remember
that stuff at all? Huh?
STRUAN THEN DECIDED TO QUOTE ME OUT OF CONTEXT:
>
> ELEPHANT:
> "Take me on if you think you're big enough."
>
> The last time anyone said that to me (apart from Rich "oh shit now I've read
> some philosophy I realise that it doesn't work after all" Pretti) was in
> primary school. What do you want me to do? Get my dick out and wave it at
> you?
WHAT I ACTUALL WROTE WAS:
"Indeed [you are] not [interested in unravelling my errors]. But I'm
interested, and I think we all are. Come on, at some point the enjoyable
abuse has to end and you have to come up with the goods. Come on Struan.
Take me on if you think you're big enough."
That put's a slighly different complexion, Struan, on your resorting to
abuse here, as I think MOQers will agree. I was, taken in context,
repeating my invitation, once again, for you and I to discuss this
seriously, and for you to answer some of the questions I have put to you.
(1) What you think 'metaphysics' means?
(2) What is Simon Blackburn (for example) if not a SOMist?
(3) What do you say to my exegesis of SOM in Wittgenstein?
(4) Are you a Wittgensetian (which would explain one or two points) or not?
(5) What do you think of Iris Murdoch's identification of an "ontological
approach" in Wittgenstein's "commonsense" (man in the street) philosophy?
(6) In what does you liking for Murdoch consist? Do you agree with any of
what she says about the inescapability of metaphysics, and the reality of
the good? If so, what, in particular?
STRUAN WROTE:
> Regarding Murdoch. Your observation that both she and Pirsig embrace
> metaphysics and are happy to talk about it is correct. Considering the fact
> that they both write about metaphysics, this is hardly surprising. Your
> following argument is akin to saying that the USA and Iran disapprove of
> Iraq, so the former must both be good friends and it would be a great idea
> to make connections between capitalist libertarianism and
> semi-fundamentalist theocracy. Perhaps it is, but I have better things to
> do.
>
> No, I'm afraid that your ideas still don't interest me and even less am I
> concerned that you give me a 'second chance'. Please don't.
>
ELEPHANT:
A thundering conclusion! But perhaps I won't let you off so easily? In
fact it is, as you well know, really quite surprising in the context of
modern academic philosophy that someone who writes *about* metaphysics
should also think of themselves as *being* a metaphysician! Your argument
here is rather like saying "both archeologists studied the remains of the
Inca empire, so it is hardly surprising that both of them thought of
themselves as Incas". Fatuous and false, I think you will agree.
It is extremely rare for a modern Philosopher to regard metaphysics as the
essential activity of philosophy, and to regard all philosophers as
essentially metaphysicians, whether they acknowledge it or not. Indeed in
this matter you, Struan, are a shining example of the modern philosophical
orthodoxy which makes Iris Murdoch's attitude so rare and unique.
Yours ever forgiving in true Christmas Spirit,
Inviting true socratic dialogue and hoping not to be condemned for my
trouble,
That Pachyderm
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